


Basting

by Maggie_Conagher



Series: Pay the Piper [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Babies, Debt, F/M, Gynecologist, Incest, Molestation, Vaginismus, tabby cats
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-30
Updated: 2016-08-22
Packaged: 2018-02-15 10:14:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 13
Words: 20,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2225244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maggie_Conagher/pseuds/Maggie_Conagher
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Molly has debt. Sherlock has an idea.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sixteen Tons

**Author's Note:**

> I'm doing an experiment with this fic. I want to see what it is like to write het after writing so much slash. I want to try smaller chapters to see if I can post more frequently. 
> 
> I haven't forgotten or stopped working on NB. Finishing it is my priority over this story but because Greg and My are in a very rough place, I needed to do something a bit lighter although this story will have a lot of its own angst. I can't seem to get away from that. sigh
> 
> It feels very uncomfortable having two longer works going at once because I take my promises very seriously and I feel like starting a fic means an implied promise that I will finish it. Giving you my best. :Thank you for all of your support and encouragement.

Part I Basting

Chapter 1 Sixteen Tons

Molly Hooper looked at the colorful salad that seemed to light up the grey walls and liver colored linoleum of the cafeteria. It was Friday and she tried to give herself a small treat to end each week, to give her hard work a sense of moment, even when she was working the weekend. Still fresh greens in winter came dear and she took the small cup of chicken soup, also known as piss water, instead. It would supplement the tired little sandwich and tin of fruit that she’d brought. 

Her lunch was gone quickly and at this odd hour, the cafeteria was nearly as empty as her stomach. She used the large table to spread out her finances. Invoices and monthly statements and her cheque book and dunning letters. Unshed tears lodged in her throat gagging her, and fear ticked like a clock in her belly. She was close to eviction, and she could likely find a room to replace the tiny two room flat but then Toby would have to go to a shelter. He was her one luxury and these days, her one true friend. 

What was going to happen to her? The load had been heavy for so long. She’d cut and cut her spending until she was washing her hair with bar soap and ready to chew on candle wax to fill her growling stomach each night, but candles were another luxury long gone. She was hungry and tired and sad all the time and so fucking alone. Alone but without privacy, the thin walls of her flat preventing the noisy release of grief that she needed. 

Her supervisor had been giving her the eyebrow over some of the tattier thrift store clothing that she’d resorted to. It was clear if she wanted to get off third shift and advance at the morgue that she would have to dress the part. This made no sense had she possessed a proper wardrobe. It was most times hidden by her lab coat and any decent clothes would have been ruined by chemicals or body fluids. The liquids she worked with were toxic and so were her coworkers, but she had been lucky to get this job and no other had prevented itself. She took abuse because she had to.

She wanted to scream and throw things until they shattered, and she wanted someone else to have the hardship for awhile. It wasn’t enough anymore for her suffering to stop; she wanted someone rich to lose every penny and stand on the corner with their belongings in a paper sack.

Her feet hurt from bad shoes and walking miles to save tube fare. Toby vomited often from the cheap food. He would look at her with betrayal in his eyes. Mummy couldn’t provide. The lack was escalating each month as she was only able to pay minimums.

The lie she had told her father, the one he had gratefully accepted, was that her schooling would enable her to get an excellent job and pay off her parents’ debts and give them fine funerals and a proper resting place. Somehow she had managed the bits that he’d seen and kept up the charade until his death from cancer three years past. Now she wondered what all the fuss had been for. In the end her mum had been a body, cold and stiff as any she tended to nightly. Her father had been the same. The wasted figure with the clownish make up had nothing to do with who her dad had been, and he was glad to go and join her mum.

On the worst days, she thought how easy it might be to join them. Toby kept her tethered. Tabby cats were a dime a dozen and he was shy like her. She’d ferreted him out of the hooded litterbox at the shelter, his chances slim and none since he hissed at all people and animals, chasing his tail compulsively, signaling to other visitors that he wasn’t quite right. He’d be put down if found with her body. So far she had hung on for his sake. The thought of him tossed on a pile of euthanized animals for the incinerator was about all that got her out of bed these days.

She added the columns of figures again, hoping for a different outcome. She would owe about ten pounds less than last month but with winter coming on, her utilities would increase by that at least. Two steps forward, one and three quarters steps back. She would have to make more negotiation calls. The last one had made her ill for a week, but the crippling nausea brought on by shame had saved her on groceries. 

Dr. Sherlock appeared as always at the worst possible time. As he loomed over her table, she scooped up the incriminating evidence, but he was the best forensic pathologist and profiler in the field. She’d given up keeping secrets from him years ago. While he knew of her plight and sometimes made cutting remarks about her appearance or food choices, he had offered no sympathy or advice. Some days she was grateful. Her debt was a fact of her without judgment on his part. 

He sat, sliding the budget worksheet from her hands. He was a genius, maybe he could solve her problems if he chose to. She would shave herself bald before she would ask, but if he offered, beggars can’t be choosers. He flipped to the total debt spread sheet she had made. “Molly, this is twenty five thousand pounds of debt. You’ll never pay this off.”

She was going to cry. He had worked toward this eventuality as if it were an all consuming goal. She had held herself in through name calling and yelling and the throwing of expensive equipment at her, a beaker once shattering against her back. She had kept her composure during a particularly mortifying shaming at a departmental Christmas party. While the reality of his sexual preference had been clear, she had fallen in love with him anyway and carried a torch high for years as his student, eventually as one of his lab assistants, and now as his whipping boy in the morgue for experiments of a dubious nature. It had been easy to ignore the fact of his gayness while he was single.

John Watson had fucked it all to hell. Literally. Now Sherlock was happy and married and probably getting ready to adopt a baby girl from China. There would be pictures on his desk and he would hum lullabies while chopping up corpses, and Molly had a cat.

His long beautiful fingers danced over the keys of the calculator. “You’ll be fifty seven before this is paid off. If you can keep the job here.”

She gritted her teeth. “I bloody well know that.”

“Then why would you get yourself into such a tangle?”

“I had medical school tuition and books and Mum’s cancer and then Dad’s fucking cancer and a last holiday for them and funerals and all of their own debt which I had no idea about until I was already so far down in the hole and I promised Dad and what the fucking hell do you care anyway, you rich bloody fucking bastard.”

She ran. She left him at the table with her most intimate things, far worse than a pair of knickers or a dildo, the papers that said she was a failure and a deadbeat and a bad risk. She tripped on a chair leg and went down and kept going until she came on a locked door at the end of a hall full of darkened offices.

Then with her face against the cold slick tile wall, she let go. She screamed herself hoarse, wondering if she might vomit. Panting and empty, she sunk to the floor on shaking legs. There was no way she could face him, but she needed her papers. Knowing his ways, he might have gone, leaving her private business on the table for anyone to see.

Just for a little while, she would sit and catch her breath with her burning eyes closed. She jumped a foot when a handkerchief was pressed into her sweaty palm.

His voice that was chocolate and warm fires and sex that didn’t hurt, said, “We’re going to help each other, Molly. You need money, and I need a baby.”


	2. I Started a Joke

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock is serious. Molly is not.

Molly’s eyes were still closed as he sat beside her, smelling wonderful and fidgeting a little. She let herself imagine carrying Sherlock’s child. Perhaps surrogacy was not her first choice but she would still get to experience pregnancy and have a part of Sherlock joined with her, inside her for nine months. God, she wanted it and would do it for free if need be.

John and Sherlock, rubbing circles on her swollen belly, even kissing it as they whispered words of love to their baby. Sherlock holding her hand as she struggled through the pain of the labor, John holding in his emotions as he cut the cord and did the Apgar and other tests. Then John would let himself cry as he put the baby on her belly and Sherlock would kiss her forehead and John would hold her hand for a bit before they kissed each other and bonded with their son. She wanted a boy; they would have a boy. 

She would require a visitation policy and become part of the family. Finally, she wouldn’t have to work holidays but would be welcome. Kisses on both cheeks from John as he hurried out of the kitchen wearing a butcher’s apron. A lingering hug from Sherlock after he took her coat. “Mummy, Mummy,” shouted the wee toddler, his mop of sandy curls flying as he ran into her arms. After dinner, she would dress him in the little hat and jumper she had knitted for him and they would all go to the park for a walk in the snow and watch skaters on the pond—

“Oh god, not that. Molly, not me. I don’t need a baby.”

“But you said,“ she swam her way back from the center of the pond where the ice had given way.

“You know what I meant. And you of all people know what a terrible parent I would be. I make you cry at least three times a week and you’re a grown woman who is used to me. It would be interesting though.”

Here he put his hand to his chin and got the look that was reserved for making Molly do something illegal or unethical with a corpse. 

She let him have his fantasy while she discarded hers. “Why would you say you needed a baby if it isn’t for you?”

“My brother needs a baby, and I want to obtain one for him.”

“Have you considered the black market?”

“I’d like to get his focus off of me now that John and I are married. He needs a new project.”

“A puppy? Volunteerism? Ship in a bottle?”

“Well, I’ve encouraged him to get a gold fish. Thus far, he’s been resistant.”

“And he’s asked you to search for surrogates?”

“No, it’s a surprise.”

Molly was thankful to be sitting on the cold, liver spotted tile. “I think he would have to be present for at least some of it unless you were planning on donating--?”

Sperm and Sherlock were not words she wanted to use together outside of her own bedroom or shower. To be sordidly candid, there had been a private staging with a banana and some tapioca, and a particular low point just before her period when she and a cucumber were as intimate as a vegetable is capable of.

“No, he wouldn’t want my genes. Arrogant bastard will only want his own, or he’d have adopted long ago.”

“And your plan? You’ll just walk up to him and say, ‘I’ve found a destitute woman that you can impregnate for a price.’”

“Something like that.” He had the look she had only seen him use with John, a search for approval.

“Yes, Sherlock, that sounds good. Get back to me Thursday week and I’ll reserve the lab and clear my schedule.”

He held out his hand and she returned the handkerchief, which he put in his pocket and rubbed his hand along his coat which was completely unfair since she had not snotted in it. Then he held out his hand again. “Isn’t this the customary sealing of a bargain? A gentleman’s agreement perhaps.”

A lovely thought occurred to her, regarding this little joke. Nothing interesting ever happened to her and this was a very interesting story for an imaginary party she might attend. “May I ask some questions?”

He nodded but she could see his interest waning. She would need to keep things brief and rollicking.

“This brother of yours, older or younger?”

“Ancient. Quite past it.”

“And looks like?”

“Are we being shallow, Molly?”

“Absolutely. Is he tall?”

“A little taller than I.”

Promising even if he was Methuselah. But oh dear. “Gay or straight?”

“Rumors of both but he was married to a woman and there’s been no evidence of a relationship since with either gender.”

“So he’s tall and dark like you?”

“Oh she is a little particular.”

“I’d like to know what sort of baby I might be sharing my uterus with, thank you very much.”

“He’s ugly as sin, ginger and therefore soulless.” Ginger or blond had been her type until Sherlock and the unfortunate episode with his TA two years ago. She shuddered at the memory but pressed on. “Can he afford to pay a surrogate and raise a child?”

She knew Sherlock came from money but she must not assume. Hadn’t she always made bad choices when it came to men and money? “He does have a job?”

Sherlock snorted. “He’ll manage. He has a government job. It’s steady work.”

He grinned in a way that spelled danger but it was boyish and she was a fool. “Shall I tell him it’s on then?”

“He may have some questions of his own before we get to the specimen cups and turkey basters but by all means, have him ring me. Don’t hesitate.”

He did shake her hand then, looking quite smug as he flung his scarf over his shoulder and marched down the hall. When Molly returned to the cafeteria, she saw that he had gathered all of her papers back into the folder and placed them under her empty tray. It was those occasional small courtesies that had kept her on the hook for so long.

But she was quite over him now that John had made him so happy. John might be the exact right person to tell her funny story to. Who else would believe it after all? With the worst of intentions, he had given her something to laugh about and it was hers to keep for free.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dashing these off without my usual OCD perfectionism. Thank you to my three subscribers. This one's for you, lol. One thing you can say, writing het is not crowded.


	3. Mr. Big Stuff

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mycroft Holmes is serious. Molly is not.

“But it was a joke. Must have been.” Molly removed the plastic visor that protected her eyes from flying bone chips, wincing as she realized that there was a considerable amount of decomposing muck on the protective gear. This generally meant that gunk was in her hair and her clothing. Her friend Stephanie had always managed to keep her lab coat pristine through staining of slides and dissecting of specimens, but Molly would be coated head to toe as if a lorry had just driven through a puddle beside her.

Mycroft Holmes blinked at this, then lifted and inspected the tip of his very prominent umbrella. “I assure you that my desire for a child is no laughing matter.”

He was tall and ginger and so much younger than she had been led to believe. He might have been handsome but the vibe she got from him was cold, hard, sharp. New words kept coming to her to describe him—bleak, harsh, closed. An ancient castle, nothing but stone. 

Dressed to the nines, he was the sort of person that always made Molly aware of her shortcomings. The hole in her jumper, the garlic on her breath, the oil on her skin. A strand of her hair chose that moment to fall across her eye. In brushing it aside, her hand came into contact with a large smear of gray matter. She grabbed at a microscope lens wipe, a harsh choice that would leave her skin raw, and swabbed at the mess, smearing it.

“Would you excuse me for just a moment please?” She fled to the loo where she was able to clean her face and pull her hair back into the elastic. Her lab coat was a lost cause but she was wearing one of her nicer jumpers.

After getting herself sorted, she stared in the mirror until her reflection made no sense. “When did life stop and leave me here?” She didn’t understand how a total stranger had walked into her lab with the expectation that she might be willing to carry his child. There seemed to be a few steps missing.

Meanwhile, he was rich and powerful. She could have cut her finger on the creases of his trousers and his pocket handkerchief. In spite of his haughty demeanor, there was an old world charm about him; he had bowed slightly before taking her hand. He had presence; he made the lab seem small.

And Molly felt less than. Here he was looking like a wax figure, every aspect of his clothing and grooming perfect, and she was filthy and smelly and shabby. It was a lucky thing that she had no intention of surrogating. Was that a word? There was no way he was putting any of his bodily fluids, if he had such things, into her vagina. It would freeze shut. She would stick to vegetables and repurposed items from her household trash.

Still, perhaps she did owe him clarification. She had told Sherlock to proceed; however facetiously she meant it, the man had come to her crypt with hat and umbrella in hand. Would he notice if she crawled into one of the drawers? Or maybe if she waited long enough in the loo, he might walk away.

He was in the hall when she peeked out. “Dr. Hooper, I must apologize for the misunderstanding. Clearly, I’ve surprised you. Would you allow me to take you to dinner as a peace offering on behalf of my brother and myself?”

Molly felt her face go through a series of muscular gymnastics. First and foremost, food, dear god let there be food. And if it could be cheese, procreative promises might be made. Then wondering what she might say between monstrous bites of cheddar and brie. Then wondering what she might wear. This was not a man that had ever darkened the door of a fish and chips shop. And what would Sherlock do if she went to dinner with his brother? That question she could skip. He’d put them both in an untenable situation, daft prick. Moving on to-- would she know what to do with all the silver. There would be a whole army of cutlery.

Mr. Holmes had been watching her more keenly than she had ever been examined in her entire life. His blue eyes seemed X ray compatible. She felt like prey. “I do enjoy the occasional fish dinner but I’d like to see that you have a proper meal. The one thing Sherlock was quite eloquent about was that you’ve struggled because of parental obligations.”

“Not obligations. Acts of love.” Tears were close suddenly as they had been when the grief was fresh. “I did what I thought was right at the time, and I’ve managed.”

“Of course you have and it’s not my intention to pry into your affairs without your permission. I only know what he told me.”

“That’s more than I care to have exposed.” She knew she’d been hypervigilant about her contact information ever since Sherlock’s TA had been revealed as a serial killer. Jim who had also seen all of her secrets pass across her face. No one was above suspicion. “Thank you for the offer but no.”

“Please don’t let pride rob you of a nice meal, meat and two veg. Let me ‘feed you up.’”

The air quotes were implied but she couldn't help looking at his long pale fingers and his large hands covered in freckles, all the money in the world could not out those damn spots. She wavered.

“Would you allow me the presumption of sending you a dress? It’s the least I could do.”

Her face flamed. She felt humiliated. He could stand there while she reeked of death and offer to buy her clothes. “I’m not bloody Cinderella and I can’t be bought for a dress.”

He pursed his lips at her outburst. “I seldom have the chance to repair the damage my brother has done to someone. I think a dress is a rather small penance, and you’ll more than earn it by having to make conversation with an elderly lout such as myself.”

“I’m a blurter.”

“Obviously.”

“My break is at seven if you’d care to meet me in the cafeteria.”

He consulted a pocket watch, and Molly looked around for the Tardis because clearly she had entered another dimension. His strange name and his ancient rituals and his way of holding himself as if he had a steel rod up his spine. Molly had won. This man would never walk into a cafeteria, let alone eat in one.


	4. Dinner for Two or Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dinner happens. Molly surprises herself.

Nothing about the entire day had been real. One of the corpses must have been rife with psychotropic drugs that soaked through her gloves. A corner of the cafeteria had been transformed with screens and candles into a dining nook. A waiter hovered, filling her water glass from a sweating silver pitcher and then readjusting the napkin on his arm.

There was a fabric cover and a cushion on the plastic bucket chair. Her feet brushed against an area rug of plush pile. Mr. Holmes sat, straight as a tower and fully composed. In a cafeteria after all, but on his terms. Clearly, Molly had not won at all.

“I don’t have much time.”

“I’ve arranged with your supervisor to extend your break to ninety minutes.”

“Under whose authority? Who are you?” She took a sip of water before she remembered that the waiter would have to refill it.

“I’m an MP.”

Molly choked on the water, most of it going down her airway. She made horrid honking sounds that raked at her throat and sent cramps through her diaphragm. Mr. Holmes motioned to the waiter who patted her lightly on the back until she could breathe again. Strands of hair had come loose and her eyes were watering, but she would not drown in front of the bloody government, at least not this day.

He offered her a lozenge from a small metal tin he produced from his suit coat pocket. He seemed to come equipped with everything but a uterus. She reminded herself that she had the one thing that he didn’t, well perhaps even more than one. Unless he was a hermaphrodite. She laughed nervously at the thought and then tried to imagine a cock long enough to get the job done anyway. Apparently it wasn’t on.

“Perhaps you can imagine my dilemma a bit better.”

She nodded, glancing at the waiter who was staring straight ahead. For some reason, she did not want to betray this powerful man’s confidence, arrogant though he might be.

“Thank you. Sherlock was right about your discretion in spite of your self-confessed habit of blurting.”  
“I would not want to harm anyone. I’m sorry that I thought you were joking. I laugh when I’m nervous but I don’t think your, your um situation is funny.” Her hands shook as she placed her napkin in her lap. “I appreciate all the bother you’ve gone to. It wasn’t necessary.”

Something in his face changed and she thought if she hadn’t known better that his eyes were kind. “It was absolutely necessary and long overdue. Your patience with my brother’s rudeness is legendary.”

“He’s not an ordinary man. I’ve made concessions.”

“I suppose we all have and not to his betterment.”

Stilted, this conversation is stilted and forced, she thought. Then the starter came and her powers of speech were gone. Prawn cocktail –colorful as spring flowers with the peachy pink bodies among red tomatoes and avocado and the green leaves of spinach and the festive purple of radicchio.

“Your eyes are shining, Dr. Hooper.”

“Please call me Molly” was her last intelligible statement for some minutes as she let herself savor the sea food and the vegetables that were garden fresh. She thought the prawns might be singing as they jumped happily into her mouth. She did not realize how engrossed she had become until she came back to herself.

“You are easily impressed.”

“I don’t want to ever be jaded. I like that little things can still make me happy.”

“Childlike wonder is a rare gift.”

She noticed that he had a small cup of clear broth with carrots and celery sticks. “You had something different. Do you not like seafood?”

“I adore it, but I’m trying to watch my diet. I intend to stay as healthy as I can for the project we were discussing.”

“Oh, of course.” He was willing to eat terrible low calorie foods when he had brilliant dishes available to him like the cocktail someone should write a song about. “You are very committed.”

His mobile vibrated in his breast pocket. “I’ll tend to that later. I’m eager for you to see my answer to a fish and chips shop.”

The grilled salmon was exquisite, paired with steamed asparagus and baby peas, it was more of spring in winter. He was eating the same as she, but with none of the sauce to make it sing. Still the herbs sprinkled on the healthy pink fish were enough. Molly alternated between eating the sizable portion plain and then with the sauce. In deference to her work, the waiter offered her sparkling mineral water with a faint raspberry flavoring. Two small raspberries danced in the bottom of her glass.

She would not have taken wine anyway. This man, however kind, was dangerous. He might be able to convince her of anything with his electric blue eyes that saw straight into her soul. She really needed to find some ordinary men to spend time with—cabbies, plumbers, builders, gardeners. Where were they?

His mobile vibrated again. “Apologies. Only my mother has this number, and she’s very sparing in her contact. My father is—ill. Will you excuse me, Molly?”

With a mouthful of salmon, she could only nod. She would not mind being alone with the meal that was a culinary wank. But Mr. Holmes did not leave the table. “Mother? What’s happened?”

Molly remembered the late night calls from hospital and her heart in the throat that it was The Call, the preliminary grief when it was a turn for the worse. They never called with good news. She felt shy that he was willing to let her see this private family moment.

“Is she alright? How long? That’s quite unfortunate. She was the best of the lot. No, I’ll find someone. Can Gardener manage until then? May I ring you back presently? Thank you.”

Molly had cleaned her plate with mortifying speed during his call. She dabbed her mouth daintily with the napkin but no one was fooled. “I should go.”

“Please stay. My father’s caregiver had a bad fall, and I must arrange a substitute. I can step away for a moment if the conversation would disturb you.”

“Not at all. I’m familiar with all aspects of elder care and there’s nothing medical that could quench my appetite.”

“I do want you to know that my father’s care is the only thing for which II would interrupt this dinner. Your enjoyment is of the utmost importance to me.”

Molly blushed and squirmed but the salad course helped her forget her discomfort. As she tried to quietly munch on the spring greens doused liberally in a lemon honey vinaigrette, she watched him.

He was all business again, stiff and cold. He pulled reading glasses and a gold pen from his ever commodious suit pocket. She wondered how his tailor managed the clean lines that held when so many items were stored there. Then Mr. Holmes bent and retrieved a leather diary from under the table. She wanted to stroke the leather, knowing it would be rich and buttery.

He pushed his own plate of barely touched salmon away, Molly eying it covetously. Then with the diary spread open, he put on horn rimmed glasses and dialed a number. As he spoke, his pen was busy on the page, sketching something that Molly couldn’t quite make out although she was able to read her own name in the appointments section.

He filled the whole right hand page with his sketch, cross hatching and shading as he had to ring a second and then a third agency. Meanwhile, Molly was dazzled by the cheese course of her prayers, pear and pomegranate slices counteracting the glorious and plentiful squares of cheese.

When he paused between conversations, she blurted again. “May I see your sketch? I’m consumed with curiosity. Occupational hazard.”

He nodded decisively but handed the book to her slowly. She wiped her hands before taking it, her heart pounding. This strange, guarded, old fashioned man had drawn a picture of a baby. Tears slowly tracked down her cheeks at the pathos of it, the child asleep in a basket, nappy padded bottom raised high, one fist curled against the boy’s cheek, curls falling into one eye.

“Are there more?” she mouthed as he was put on hold.

He nodded and flipped to the front of the diary and made a turning motion with his fingers. She looked one last time for permission and then did what her racing heart told her to. She turned page after page to sketches of babies, toddlers, and kindergarten children. Happy faces, pouting faces, and outraged cries. Nappies and rattles and bottles and teething biscuits and teddies covered journal pages on the right while doctor’s and dentist’s appointments and menus of meals past with calorie counts covered the left page in between coded entries that she assumed to be important government business.

She came to the smaller portion of the pages yet to be filled for the year and then to the appendix where she found in careful script a chart labeled “What to Expect Before You are Expecting.” There were page numbers for reference and checkmarks as he had completed each task, appointments and lifestyle changes. He was clearly following some kind of time line laid out in a book, preparations for this long expected child. She was as touched by the list as she had been by the sketches.

The waiter brought coffee and fresh cream. Molly wanted to bathe in it and when the chocolate cake came with a red cherry sauce, she wanted to weep. But she was drawn back to the sketches, flipping to her favorite, a fat curly haired baby covered in his first taste of custard, sitting in the tub, clutching a rubber duck. She traced the lines, feeling the grooves of his pen had made. Her hands shook and her cheeks grew warm.

When he rang off a final time, his father’s care again assured, he reached for the diary. Molly looked at him as she passed it back, and she waited, wanting him to understand that this was not a blurt. “I want to try,” she said.


	5. Devil Woman

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Molly spends a difficult morning with a difficult woman.

Molly woke with pounding heart. Toby had left his usual place on her pillow which meant danger. Her heart wasn’t pounding alone; someone was knocking loudly on the door. 8:02 AM. Molly threw on a dressing gown over her ancient nightie and wished that her stocking feet would make decisive clicking sounds as she went to look through her peep hole.

A young woman in business attire. At last Molly was being dunned in person. They would take the last of her things. Or she was being evicted. Or taken in for questioning in a murder case. Fear always trumped her anger. She opened the door a crack, mindful that Toby might race out and be lost. “May I help you?”

“Dr. Hooper, I’m from Mr. Holmes; he told you to expect someone.”

“Yes, but not quite so soon. We just had dinner late last night.”

“Time is of the essence for this project. May I come in?”

Molly wanted to refuse and meet the woman in a coffee shop, but did not feel that she could. So this woman in the bespoke navy suit and mile high pumps took in the one tatty chair covered with a bedspread, last night’s work clothes scattered in a trail toward the loo, and the kitchenette’s worktop covered in dirty dishes.

“Having a lie in?” the woman asked, her judgmental gaze scanning Molly head to toe.

“I work evenings and have a commute.”

“But you get off at midnight and it’s past eight now.”

“I don’t just fall asleep the moment I walk in the door.”

“Well, you certainly aren’t spending your free time on cleaning.”

Molly pulled her dressing gown tighter and felt ashamed even though the woman was being rude. It was one thing to know that someone was being an unconscionable bitch but another to confront the bitchiness. Mr. Holmes trusted this woman and he was more than thorough.

Mr. Holmes’ representative pulled out a diary that matched her suit. “We have the gynecologist first thing while you are fresh from the bath. I’ve allowed twenty minutes for extra tidying of your …person, and then it’s the dentist for a checkup and cleaning, followed by the nutritionist. Based on the nutritionist’s guidelines, we’ll choose a place for luncheon and then we have dress fittings at one, a quick pop in to the cobbler’s and haberdasher’s, an update of your passport, and we should have you back to the morgue in time for your shift.”

An entire day in this woman’s company. Molly wanted to crawl under the bed with Toby. She hadn’t been able to sleep for thinking about the possibility of a child. Mr. Holmes had been solemn in spite of what might be considered good news. He had kissed her hand again, bowing low, and told her that someone would contact her within the next week. Sherlock had said that his brother would pay for a child and Molly considered getting out of debt. She thought about having more meals such as the one he’d provided, but mostly she thought about making someone’s dream come true. How many chances could one get in life to make another person happy? She had lain awake until four picturing the drawings in his diary and how gentle his voice had been when speaking to his mother.

“Where shall I meet you when I’m dressed?”

“I’ll be right here,” she said, frowning as she swiped at toast crumbs on the dinette table. “You do have something suitable to wear?”

“I have a suitable suit. It’s done for several funerals and job interviews.”

“Perhaps I should move the meeting with the dressmaker to this morning and cancel the dentist.”

“Maybe you’d like to count my teeth to check my age?”

She got a raised eyebrow for that one. But this woman would not be part of the agreement, surely. Her arrangement if she passed muster was with Mr. Holmes and he had seemed kind. An MP couldn’t make time for fussy little appointments, most of them for woman’s things. She would see him again for more appropriate activities.

In the shower, she cut herself trying to get through the thick triangle of hair. Jim had laughed himself sick and called her his little gorilla. Her hands shook and she took a chunk out of her ankle where the hair was thick as a Shetland pony’s. 

A thought stopped her cold. What if he wanted a baby the old fashioned way? Oh god, oh god, oh god. She had been assuming artificial insemination or even egg donation, nothing direct. While she might be willing to spread her legs for a good cause, she couldn’t imagine Mr. Holmes getting the job done in his reserve. Perhaps through a hole in a muslin sheet.

Was he gay? How disastrous was his first marriage that he hadn’t tried again? In the end, the free lunch spurred her on. She would take a lot of abuse for a sandwich. The black suit hurt to wear as she’d buried both her mother and father while wearing it and been turned down for countless jobs in it. The color was too strong for her and even with a lilac blouse, made her look like a war orphan.

“Can’t say you’re a tart in that get up.”

Molly ignored the dig. Maybe a man as reserved as Mr. Holmes needed a dragon lady at his gate. “What shall I call you?”

“For our purposes, you may call me Anthea.”

“Is that your name?”

“Something like.” With a barracuda’s smile, she ushered Molly to the waiting car.

Molly was in the stirrups in record time and her grandmother’s voice arrived per usual. “Dirty girls touch themselves. Men can tell when you’re dirty. Let me look. I’ll know if you’ve been messing about down there.”

The doctor was posh but courteous; Anthea’s presence did not help Molly to relax but she understood the necessity. The shame of being naked before a mean girl was wiped out by the piercing pain that shot through her as he tried to insert the speculum. She managed not to cry out but her fists clenched and as he pushed the instrument up to maneuver past the spasming muscles, she felt as though only her heels and the back of her head were touching the exam table, so great was the pain. Tears leaked out and dripped onto the paper. “Vaginismus?”

She nodded, gasping as he drove the speculum home. “I’ve always had it during exams.”

“Depending on your method, that could impede conception.” He looked to the authority figure in the room.  
Anthea seemed to have an answer for everything. “We’re planning on artificial insemination. Since Molly is a doctor, she’s quite capable of managing at home to start. If we should need the assistance of a medical environment, she would have sedation in her favor.”

“Many lesbian couples manage at home quite well. There now, the worst is over,” he said, pulling out the duck shaped metal and half her insides with it. “That’s why I always get to it straight away.”

He palpated her abdomen which started another string of cramps, but she closed her eyes and bore it. The fact that she wore a stylish fabric gown instead of a paper one didn’t matter one whit when he reached under it to press her breasts and squeeze her nipples. “You may have to supplement the breast with bottles. Time enough for that discussion with your lactation coach.”

Hairy, overly tight cunt, flat chest, and bad fashion sense. Mr. Holmes had better run screaming before getting a charity shop human incubator. Once the exam was over and the doctor had taken Anthea off for consult, she tried to clean the lube and small smear of blood out of herself with tissues. Putting her clothes back on didn’t make her feel any less naked. Along with the physical pain and the humiliation, she was surprised to find that she was slightly disappointed that Mr. Holmes did want a baster baby.


	6. Apples, Peaches, Pumpkin Pie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Molly reaps the fruits of her labor.

Molly was exhausted from working two jobs, her regular job at the morgue and then all the hoops that Lady Anthea was making her favorite circus poodle jump through. She had survived the pelvic exam although she was still sore with some spotting. She had muddled through being stripped to her knickers and had a bra properly fitted, the assistant holding her old one between thumb and forefinger with an upraised pinky as she chucked it in the tasteful porcelain wastebasket. If she’d known how much her tits were going to be out, she might have taken more care when getting ready but she had been timed while doing so.

The following day, Anthea had arrived thirty minutes later as if that helped anything. Molly had to pick two therapists at random from the directory and see each of them. How they were able to wrangle a same day appointment involved some sort of bribery or threats she was sure but did not ask. Then she was required to see a third of Mr. Holmes’ choosing. She sobbed her way through all three appointments and was convinced that she had cheated herself out of her opportunity and that the brothers Holmes would read the transcripts with barely suppressed mirth.

When she got to the morgue, shaken with a swollen face and slitted eyes, there was a huge bouquet of peach roses and a card that read “Thank you for your efforts on behalf of me and my child.” The same sentiment was on the huge fruit basket that Anthea brought the next morning when they made a tour of financial planners. Mollly cried through these appointments as well. Financiers had no qualms whatsoever about being judgmental. “I did the best I could,” she said to each one, pulling down her skirt to hide the ladder in her stockings and keeping her feet firmly on the floor because the sole of her ballet flat had nearly worn through.

After work, she could barely climb the stairs from the tube station, but rewards awaited her. A great trove of magazines sat in her post box, maternity and parenting ones and even a literary magazine for cat lovers with full color photos of cats and kittens. Once inside her flat, she had delicious fruit to eat. She held a plum in her hand for a long while, sniffing it occasionally. It was a work of art, too pretty to eat, but she finally bit into it and let the juice run down her chin. Something would happen to ruin this chance but in the meanwhile, she was going to take whatever she could get. She had fucking earned it with all those humiliating appointments.

The next morning, Anthea arrived at the earlier time, a young delivery man with her. He carried a huge box which turned out to be full of prepared meals based on the nutritionist’s guidelines. Apparently, Molly needed to gain weight in order to conceive properly. Anthea had a basket of fresh produce for Molly’s use as well.

The nasty woman handed her a large dark green envelope. “While you persist in working, you won’t have time to prepare proper meals for yourself so he’s hired a service. I told him you didn’t have room for more than a few days’ worth. You’ll have to call and arrange a time for the deliveries when you will be awake.”

The envelope contained a meal planning kit so next time Molly could choose her own meals and there was the ubiquitous card with the now familiar sentiment “Thank you for your efforts etc."

As Molly packed her small fridge with more food than she usually saw in a month, Anthea wiped off the small dinette chair with a frown and sat, picking at her mobile. From her briefcase, she produced two hardback books and a small box. “All of your blood levels check out as normal for a woman of your age and capable of producing a child, but I’ve convinced Mr. Holmes that we need to make sure all of your organs are in perfect health as well since you are a bit past it for optimal results.”

“In the meanwhile, he’s sent you the books that he’s using, the What to Expect series and a state of the art thermometer for tracking your cycle.”

Molly tucked the last of the dinners in and carried the box to the bedroom. Toby would enjoy playing in it if he ever came out from under the bed. Cats could sense demonic presences and there had been daily visitations. She wondered if she would ever see Mr. Holmes again or if it would be the delivery man with a wee plastic cup each month.

Anthea continued as if Molly hadn’t left the room. “We have a light day today. Final dress fittings and interviews with solicitors. Next week, you’ll meet with the one of your choosing, and I’ve scheduled the laparoscopy for Thursday.”

“Isn’t that a bit extreme?”

“Mr. Holmes is investing a huge amount of time and money. I do not want to waste any of his hopes on someone who may prove to have unforeseen problems. In addition, he is not a young man and each month counts a great deal.”

“I have to give two weeks’ notice if I’m going to miss work.”

“I’ll see to that if I may have the number for your supervisor.”

Molly gave it, feeling the room spin as what little illusion of control she ever had drifted away.

Anthea flicked her fingers in the direction of the bedroom. “Now then, put on your little suit for the last time. We’ll be picking up some of your new things today and your dress is ready for dinner with Mr. Holmes this evening.”

“Dinner?”

“Now that we’ll have you dressed properly, it’s time you were seen in public with him. Lends an air of authenticity to the faux courtship.”

“Faux courtship?”

“Stop being a wee parrot. The faux courtship followed by the sham marriage. Surely he told you?”

As Molly sunk into the chair which wasn’t there because the delivery man had moved it to bring the box in, her bottom collided with hard linoleum. “Sham marriage?”

“Mr. Holmes’ constituents are quite conservative. You’ll have to marry him to carry his baby, dear. Of course, if your ovaries aren’t in order, this ridiculous plan is at an end, but you’ll get to keep the fruit and the dinners.”

“Of course. But the dresses will turn back into pumpkins and the little mice will carry them away.”

“Have you gone hysterical? Will I have to slap you?”

“No, I’d much prefer to slap you if there’s a need.” Molly was still laughing as she showered.

She hadn’t been specific enough when she had prayed to marry a Holmes. God delighted in being jokey, it would seem.


	7. Feed Me, Seymour

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Molly and Mycroft have an awkward dinner but the food and clothes are lovely.

After the plastic cape was removed, Molly adjusted the autumn paisley scarf over her crimson dress. She was thankful that the scarf covered some of the curves revealed by the bespoke garment. Baggie things worked better for her. Massive jumpers covered by lab coats and trousers with pleats helped her feel safe. In this dress, she could not hide. Since the purpose of the evening was display, she was costumed appropriately. 

Anthea had lectured her throughout the hair and make up session, not allowing Molly to watch the process as she was instructed on proper etiquette for the silver and the various glasses as well as possible topics for dinner conversation. When the two stylists had done all they could, they looked to Anthea for approval, not their victim. “Silk purse, sow’s ear, you’ve done your best. Merci.”

Molly’s stick straight hair had been pulled back loosely so as to disguise her cup handle ears and honey colored waves artfully arranged to look natural hung down, accenting small amber earrings. Her make up covered freckles and played up her cheekbones which downplayed the upward tilt of her nose.

“Now then, isn’t that better?”

But it wasn’t better. It was someone else. Not Molly Hooper. This confident and stylish woman would not agree to bear a child for a stranger. She would laugh at the idea. Only dumb old Molly Hooper with her giant kitten jumper and pony tail would agree to such a foolish project and the dragon lady and her toad of a boss had best recall that. Her cheeks flushed with anger. She was at that level of exhaustion where everything irritated her and she was hungry.

“If you’re going to let your cheeks go ruddy like a school girl’s, we’ll have to tone down the blush.”

Her true emotions were quickly tamped down with a powder puff. Molly wanted to scrub her face raw, pull her hair back, and get into her dressing gown and wank herself to sleep. On her only night off for the week, a week of constant demands, she just wanted rest. Going out was even less tempting now that she had food in her flat. Yet memories of the grand meal Mr. Holmes had provided last time spurred her on.

Anthea helped her step into brown, low heeled pumps and gave her a matching clutch purse with lipstick for touch ups, tissues, and breath mints. There was a beautiful coat too, dark brown and soft to touch. Molly’s last new coat had been a childhood one with cream faux fur around the hood and cuffs. She had petted it so often, pretended it was her very own puppy, that the fur had become sticky and dingy and no amount of laundering helped.

They walked to the car but Mr. Holmes was not there. “You didn’t think he’d wait for you?” Anthea rolled her eyes and got in the car first. “Keep in mind that you work for him and not the other way round. Come on then.”

Molly hated her and while rage was the obvious emotion, she mostly felt ashamed. Tarting her up certainly fit the bill, and here was a scarlet dress for a scarlet woman, willing to rent out her uterus to all comers.

“Stop chewing on your lips. Making them visible cost a pretty penny.”

“Are you having dinner too?”

“I should be. You need a minder, but Mr. Holmes wants to go it alone, god help him.”

Molly wanted to ask why Anthea hated her so much but she was too weak to bear the answer. She put her hands in her coat pockets and found gloves, soft as kittens inside, mustard colored supple leather on the outside, a pleasing contrast to all the muted autumn tones. She hid her manicured talons in the gloves. Anthea said that she couldn’t wear any rings so that when Mr. Holmes put an engagement ring on her finger, it would pop.

She closed her eyes to enjoy the moment. Warm, safe, dry, well fed, well dressed, not alone. None of it was the way she had planned for marriage or a baby but in some mediocre sense, she was wanted. That counted for something.

Then the door of the car opened and he was there. Her heart gave a little jump of fear. He was different than she remembered, courteous but distant. “Good evening, Dr. Hooper. You look well.”

“Thanks to you,” she said, flexing her fingers inside her soft gloves.

“Would you excuse us for a few minutes? I have details to complete with Miss Black so that my full attention can be yours for the rest of the evening.”

“Of course.” What she preferred is that he not finish his details so that his mobile would interrupt dinner and she could go home early. But he pressed a button and a telly dropped down from the ceiling. Before he turned to an impatient Anthea, he showed her how to work the remote which had far more buttons than her ancient black and white. She dutifully fumbled with it, choosing a documentary about the ocean, the swirling colors and crisp picture in high definition as magical as her first glimpse of telly when she was a child.

They were soon on the street in front of the restaurant, whisked inside by an overeager maitre’d, who took her coat. She wanted to cling to the gentle folds of it and sleep for days, but Mr. Holmes’ hand rested lightly on her lower back and she followed the waiter through the maze of tables, her legs protesting at the support of new shoes.

Their table was in an alcove and dimly lit. Mr. Holmes ordered for her. She knew that as a modern, independent woman, she should resent the presumption as well as the hand on her back, but she liked it. Her life was full of throat clenching independence and the novelty of someone else taking charge was delicious. To his credit, he asked her preferences on a few of the dishes, but he seemed to already know many of her favorites. The meals company must have shared her selections.

Until the food came, he made small talk, a skill she did not have, either losing the thread of it or making awkward confessions or blurting as was her wont. Fortunately, the service was rapid and she was soon looking at a lovely sculpture, a wheel of tiny canapés. She didn’t know whether she could eat them with her fingers or not. Exhaustion washed over her suddenly, and she stared at the silver which seemed far away and too heavy to lift. 

“Perfectly acceptable to eat with your fingers or with the fork furthest from your plate.”

Slightly embarrassed that he felt the need to tutor her in etiquette, she said, “I know which fork to use, but I don’t know you.”

“You are at a slight disadvantage, but—“

She interrupted him, another one of her bad habits. “Even if you did want to share something personal, this is likely the wrong venue. I feel like I’m in a play where everyone else has rehearsed but I haven’t even seen the script.”

“I have a recurring nightmare that’s similar.”

She was biting her lips again and could feel that wherever Anthea was, she would know and Molly would get a scolding later. “This is a performance, isn’t it? It should look like a date? I’m not sure how to achieve that.”

“No, Molly. Tonight is for us to get better acquainted. We’ll have other dinners for public display. Does that help at all?”

“I don’t want you to be ashamed of me. In my whole life, I’ve never eaten at a place so nice and it’s overwhelming.”

“I’m horribly out of practice at consulting a guest. Next time, we’ll discuss the venue in advance. Say the word and we’ll leave now and go somewhere less grand."

The waiter appeared. “Is everything to your satisfaction, sir?”

“My companion has had a difficult day, and we may need to leave but the food and service are without fault.” The waiter bowed and left. “It’s just dinner, my dear. Nothing is required of you but taking sustenance.”

Molly picked up the round of pumpernickel with salmon cut in the shape of a flower with a little herb stem. She chewed in ecstasy for some time, staring only as high as the candle centerpiece. When she finally summoned the courage to look up, blue eyes were watching her in the same way she imagined she looked when she could afford to give Toby a bit of tuna. She determined to be a proper little pet and reached for the next canapé.


	8. The Windmills of My Mind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Terrified by the legalese during a preliminary meeting regarding prenuptial agreements, Molly dissociates but Mycroft brings her back.

The light from the floor to ceiling windows was gray, harsh winter light that made Molly’s tired eyes ache. Mr. Holmes’ solicitor was discussing a finer point of the prenuptial contract and the party of the second part was exhausted from working two jobs, the morgue and being Anthea’s pet project, and having a minor procedure that had not felt minor at all. 

Even though central heating kept the room a comfortable temperature, Molly felt as if the winter wind swirled around her. Hands and feet numb, nose chilled, she began to fade. There was a game she had played as a teen when she was in a situation that she couldn’t avoid with books, music or telly. She would say, “When did life stop and leave me here?” and then do an inventory of the events that had brought her to that situation. Of course, she also used to stare in the mirror until she didn’t recognize the face staring back but that was not possible in her current state.

With ease, she tuned out the stentorian tones of the law’s most arrogant representative. Her own council had said very little so far; she hoped he was not leading her into some sort of white slavery contract. Mr. Holmes sat across from her and put an oar in now and then, asking highly intelligent and perceptive questions for clarification. He had glanced at her occasionally, but he looked so official in his suit and the table was quite large so that Molly felt he was a stranger again instead of the kind man who had fed her an outrageously expensive dinner that first time and then escorted her home, all the way home. He had even insisted on walking her to the door of her flat, his nostrils flaring at the smell of cat piss in the stairwell and cabbage in the hall. The railing was sticky again and Mrs. Alton had dropped a pair of her industrial sized knickers in the hall again after visiting the launderette.

This was not a memory that Molly cared to revisit. Nor did she want to think about her surgery. Intellectually, she could understand that Mr. Holmes wanted to invest in a sure thing, but emotionally, when she lay on the gurney and a male nurse came in to shave her, she was devastated. The heavy preoperative sedative did not help at all as the man hacked at the stubble on her privates with not one but seven razors before wearily calling her clean.

She was instructed to count backwards from 100 by sevens but instead, she kept whispering, “I don’t want this. Please don’t do this.”

“It’s already done, love,” an older nurse had said, patting her as she lay in recovery. “Your friend is here to take you home as soon as you can wee for us.”

Molly enjoyed two days in bed save for her supervisor constantly texting her to ask about paperwork or where the tongue depressors were kept. Finally, it was easier to just go on in rather than take the third and fourth day she had been allowed. Darlene had called in sick again and when the supervisor asked, she went, fortified by paracetamol and a bucket she kept by the examination table.

Anthea had been livid when the results came and Molly’s pipes were cleared for action. She had sighed and looked Molly over. “I suppose we’ll have to make due.”

The prenuptial agreement was one of the last steps. Molly and Mr. Holmes had been seen regularly having dinner which Molly survived by focusing on the food, attending ballet and opera which Molly had survived by dissociating, and taking walks which Molly had survived by galloping alongside like a pony following a Percheron until Mr. Holmes had adjusted his stride with stilted apologies.

Her awkward conversations with him were somewhere between job interview and therapy session. She searched his face for approval and even though she had the job, still felt she needed to win him over. He asked probing questions that kept her jabbering and evaded giving away much about himself at all. He knew about her life from start to finish, knew all of her issues with coworkers (mainly that they weren’t working while she did) and knew about all of the people in her building. She’d had to get over the fact that he likely knew it all before he even asked her to be his surrogate.

Her attorney spoke and she looked down at her copy of the contract, furrowing her brow and licking her lips as she traced a finger across a sentence that might as well have been Sanskrit. She hoped that she looked suitably intelligent. The cold was penetrating her breasts and belly and she went deeper within herself. 

Her grandmother’s voice hissed off the walls of her mind. “Selling yourself. You think marriage makes it right? Unless you are married in a church before God, it’s naught but another kind of whoring. And don’t think using cups and tubes makes it any more proper.”

Her grandmother would have never said such a thing to nine year old Molly but the voice held forth on all sorts of relevant sexual topics in constant judgment. Molly could silence it when wanking by pretending to be a whore, but in this setting, when she was weary and sore, it scraped across all her healed places.

Most of her coping skills were crumbling. Thoughts of Sherlock used to work for self soothing. She would get through hours on her feet in the lab by fantasizing about him finding her and finally making observations of how valuable an assistant she was and then with tears in his eyes, he would hold her, his body slowly warming to the task. Sometimes, she would come back to herself, arms locked around her middle.

She would dream of him too, his chapped lips rough on her forehead as he gently kissed her. She would wake to the rasping of Toby’s tongue on her forehead, his feline sensibilities offended by the heavy oil of sleep on her skin.

Since John, her Sherlock fantasies had lost their potency, and she hadn’t replaced him. There was little material to work with since the sort of men who worked in the morgue were the type, like herself, who had failed at their higher calling. Morgan had copious nose and ear hair which he dug at constantly and occasionally would pluck one out and hold it up in triumph. Thomas referred to himself in the third person, and Matthew was cold and distant since she had refused to attend his church.

Without internet or telly for personal use, she had no idea what was happening in fandom and missed her uni days when she had lived for actors and their characters, thrills running all through her at the various hurt/comfort scenarios she created and shyly shared online. 

The cold crept up her spine. It was coming from inside her; her nerves were frayed. She finally gave up all pretense of listening and let the white mist come down.

Mr. Holmes’ voice brought her back. “Dr. Hooper? Dr. Hooper? Molly?”

It was the first time he’d said her Christian name even though she had told him that he could. “I’m sorry. I’m not very smart about contracts.”

He looked very stern as he came around the table to stand over her. She had to crane her neck, stiff with the cold, to look up into assessing eyes and a clenched jaw.

“Please don’t be angry with me. I’ll sign whatever you say whether I understand it or not.”

“A tempting offer but one I won’t allow. Anthea, we’ll need scalding hot tea, very strong and very sweet. Collins, I’ll need the room for a few minutes, if you’d be so kind.”

Molly watched the pompous expert vacate his own conference room as if he were a junior partner. Knowing that his orders would be carried out, Mr. Holmes shook hands with Molly’s solicitor and walked him to the door. Molly began to shiver with cold and fright. She had ruined the meeting.

She called over her shoulder. “I’m fine. Please don’t go.”

The chairs were on castors so no one had to do their own scooting up to the table. He turned her chair and then glided his own so that they were facing each other. For a moment, his forehead looked corrugated and she wanted to touch it, but he blinked and the look of worry was smoothed away so she thought it was wishful thinking.

She begged. “I’m so sorry. I’ve cost all of you time and every second counts for getting this plan on the way. I’ve lost us another day and--"

“It’s crucial that you understand all of your rights, Molly. You and I and your solicitor will have a less formal meeting and explain any unfamiliar terms and concepts of the contract. Then you can make an educated choice. It’s the language of the trade, no different than the Latin you use for anatomy and chemistry, hmm?”

Anthea came in with the tea, her face bland when speaking to Mr. Holmes but her eyes looked daggers when she faced Molly. The cup rattled in the saucer and Molly carefully placed it on the table. It was light as eggshells and should she drop it, it would take all of her earnings as a surrogate to replace it. She couldn’t resist stroking over the pure white of the classic design, the warmth seeping into her frozen fingers.

“Sorry that I’m so dim.”

He smiled at this and she could breathe again. “Well, doctor, I hardly think that ‘dim’ is the proper adjective. Exhausted is more accurate. I promise that once we are married, you’ll have more time for rest.”

“Married.” She was still getting used to the word.

“Part of the contract allows for you to quit working should your health require it. I respect your career and your independence, but you must take better care of yourself.”

She nodded, close to tears from being so tired. Maybe just a sip of tea if she used both hands. Her fingers curved around the cup, the warmth searing them to the china.

“Allow me,” he said, hand over hers to steady the cup as she sipped.

Kindness brought her closer to weeping than the harshest rebuke, and she couldn’t lose herself in front of him. There would be no recovering for either of them from that sort of display. “I can manage now. Thank you for being so patient.”

He helped her with her coat and handed the new slim briefcase that he had bought her to Anthea to carry. “Dr. Hooper is under a great deal of strain. We’ll drop you at the office and then I’ll see her home.”

“I’ll just take the tube,” Molly said, her voice sounding as wobbly as the floor that bobbed and weaved under her feet. 

“I think not,” he said, his hand going automatically to the small of her back. At first she had liked the contact, but now it felt empty and proprietary because there was no affection behind it. 

She hung onto the rail in the lift, her knees giving a bit as they touched down. Her body surrendered to gravity and walking the few steps to the car was like the first few steps after being in a swimming pool for hours. Her weight had tripled during the meeting.

Talk flowed around her in the car. Usually she enjoyed listening to Anthea crawl for their employer, but today she could only try to keep her heavy lids up. Blinking, however, was socially acceptable. It was a reflex; everyone did it. If her blinks were a little longer, she was at one end of the blinking spectrum but still within a reasonable range.

A wash of cold air swept through the folds of her coat dress, bringing her half awake and shivering. She tried to lift her head but it seemed to be fastened to the depths of the cushioned seat. “I’m awake.”

“Of course you are, my dear.”

There was rustling and a dip and sway of the seat under her. Then a warm weight was being tucked around her even over her numbed feet. 

“It will be some time before we get through this heavy traffic. Just rest.”

She sighed and nuzzled into the collar of his coat. It smelled like biscuits. The windmill shapes; she couldn’t think of the other name. It was German maybe? Ginger and nutmeg and almond. A man that smelled of biscuits would never hurt her. She gave herself fully to sleep.


	9. Walking on Sunshine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mycroft proposes.

In the dining room of Mr. Holmes’ substantial flat, Molly stifled a belch behind her hand. The celebratory luncheon had been long and with Mr. Holmes and the two solicitors doing most of the talking, she had concentrated on eating the healthy but filling meal. She would put it in her food diary later. Roast chicken with potatoes and winter vegetables, a crunchy green salad with the dew still on as though fresh from the garden, a cheese course with hers being the full fat variety and served with crunchy red grapes and dear little bruschetta, and for dessert, a cherry crumble with bits of dark chocolate mixed into the compote. She was sipping coffee with fresh cream as the two men made leave taking noises. Mr. Holmes would be seeing her home; she did not have to work that night. All was well.

Except that she had just signed a contract that should she ‘produce a child,’…. this phrase made her think of her vagina as a magician’s top hat where in due time the obstetrician would wave a hankie over the stretched opening and voila, a screaming blood soaked baby. Or if she focused on the word ‘produce,’ she imagined the baby being brought out in a cornucopia of vegetables by a farmer in a straw hat.

But she digressed. The contract stated that when the baby came, she would stay for a period to nurse it if she were able. In trying not to stare at her chest to determine this possibility, all three men had made her feel topless. Once said child was weaned or she proved dry, she was to fade gradually from Mr. Holmes' household. They would work throughout the conception year to determine the manner of this departure but possibilities discussed included being torn away by her career and the long hours it required, a tempting job offer in another city, or poor health. None of these seemed a sound enough reason to leave a baby, and Molly didn’t like the idea of her image being that of a gadabout or a career driven woman. She also felt that Mr. Holmes’ imposing minion had implied that if Molly were to begin dating, Mr. Holmes could file for divorce, branding her an adulteress.

Molly had kept these feelings to herself since every little point was being argued. She was glad she knew in advance that lunch would be provided or she would have taken off her leather shoe and gnawed on it like a stale biscuit. The relief of the bloody contract finally being completed and signed had pushed the nagging anxiety to the far distant future. She had a year to get pregnant and if she didn’t conceive until near the end of that year, the pregnancy would stretch into the second year which left plenty of time to concoct an exit strategy. Maybe she could become a medical missionary to a third world country, sacrificing the love of her husband and child for the good of some lepers.

Mr. Holmes came back into the room, trying to smooth down his carefully styled forelock from where his hands had raked through it in frustration during a heated debate about artificial insemination. His tie had been loosened in the verbal melee, and he had eventually thrown off his suit coat in a fit of pique. Since he had been arguing that Molly as a doctor would be perfectly capable of inseminating herself, she had quite enjoyed the display. She expected David Attenborough to come into the room and all three men to jump on the couches, beating their chests and displaying their red, engorged buttocks.

“You are looking quite pleased with yourself.”

“I was thinking about fertility rites.”

“Perhaps we can stay in the present of the rest of the afternoon? If you’d care to stay. Anthea said she had kept the day free for you.”

“Yes, I don’t have to work tonight.” She sipped at her coffee. He was surveying her with the Holmes Laser. Like Sherlock, Mr. Holmes could see everything she had said and done in the past forty eight hours at least as well as every thought in her head. As the piercing assessment continued without an accompanying smile to soften it, she thought he might be checking for tumors her comprehensive physical had missed.

Finally, the confident, passionate orator disappeared, and the gentle voice was back. “I had thought you might like a tour but you look so comfortable there by the fire that it can wait.”

“You’ve put me nearest the fire. Most of my days are spent in a freezer so I’ve become a fire worshipper.”

He smiled and it wasn’t his social obligation one that made her think of a crocodile gazing on a Yorkshire terrier. “Are you also a sun worshipper?”

“I don’t remember what the sun looks like. I’ve seen it on the telly and hope to see it again someday.”

“We have one more order of business.”

“Oh god. I can’t be bothered.”

His pale eyebrows reached for his receding hairline, not in disapproval but in disappointment. “Of course, you can’t. My apologies.”

“I’m sorry. It’s the blurting. Chronic condition. I can be bothered with whatever you’d like to talk about.”

He nodded but didn’t speak, pouring himself a full glass of wine which he drank down in one go. If she hadn’t seen him eviscerate his own attorney, she would have thought that his hands were shaking from nerves, but Alpha males were never tentative. They did not get their feelings hurt by foolish girls who were feeling sassy with food and wine.

He pulled a one inch square brown velvet pouch from his waistcoat pocket and slowly undid the drawstring. She wondered if he was getting ready to smoke the world’s most expensive pipe or have a cup of tea worth more than the crown jewels.

He stood up, presumably to fetch a pipe or a kettle, but knelt in front of her chair instead. “The contract was for your protection and the child’s, but this is our private agreement. I know we are pretending, but I’d like to think that I can give you a pleasant life for our time together. I do not take for granted your generosity and your sacrifice.”

He shook his head and sighed. “I’m sorry. That was stilted and pompous. May I try again?”

“But you know the answer. I signed the paper.” She had wanted him to be less formidable, but now he seemed shorter and uncertain and it made her stomach hurt.

“The romance is make believe, but my gratitude and my concern for your welfare are most assuredly real. Molly, during our time together, I will protect you and provide for you to the best of my ability. Anything that you need or want, you have only to ask. Will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”

She nodded, her eyes blurring with tears. She hadn’t realized deep in her gut that her first marriage proposal would be a sham as would her first child; it hurt. She mustn’t let him see how much.

He took her left hand and slipped on the ring. A few tears slipped down, and he wiped them away before kissing her cheek. It was the slightest brush of cold lips against her flushed skin. “If you don’t like the ring, we can have another made before the photo shoot.”

She wiped her eyes to have a better look. It was huge. The yellow oval flashed on her hand, catching the firelight. Tiny brown diamonds winked all around it.

“The stones aren’t traditional for engagement; please be honest.”

“Nontraditional stones for a nontraditional marriage. I like it very much.” She let him see her eyes; he would know what she couldn’t say.

He sank back in his chair, his long pale fingers brushing the velvet of the bag back and forth to make patterns. “Chocolate diamonds are of lesser quality, I know, but I hope the center stone makes up for that. I wanted you to have sunshine and chocolate for always.”

“And yellow is my favorite color.”

“And brown for your eyes.”

She felt seen in the best of ways. Plain, mousy Molly had been given a ring as if she counted. She wanted to hug him, but even her impulsive nature couldn’t get her all the way past that cool reserve. He was kind but didn’t seem the type who would appreciate an impromptu show of affection.

“No one else will have one like this. It’s just for me.” She held her hand out, fluttering her fingers to make it sparkle. “Thank you so much, Mr. Holmes.”

“Now that we are engaged perhaps you should start using my Christian name. I doubt even my most conservative constituents would be so Victorian as to require you to call me ‘mister.’”

She knew his name from his card and the contract but couldn’t imagine using it on a daily basis. Nevertheless, she tried, “Thank you, M-Myc-uh-croft.”


	10. Going to the Chapel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Wedding

The registry office was freezing. Molly was thankful that she was being married in a proper suit rather than a meringue wonder. If the suit provided minimal warmth, at least her rock hard nipples would be shielded. She regretted having her legs waxed as her winter Shetland pony look did serve to keep her warm under trousers. The pillbox hat with veil kept the North wind from shooting down the part in her hair and numbing her brain.

Anthea was her maid of honor, or minder as the case might be. Molly had been lectured and mocked for the entire two hours it had taken to get her presentable. Anthea kept referring to her as the ‘virgin bride’ and admonishing her to ‘lie back and think of England’ followed by raucous laughter. Molly suspected there had been pills and drinks for breakfast.

Mr. Holmes, also known as Mycroft, had Sherlock for a best man. It would look proper in the papers, as would the fact that it was a small private ceremony on Christmas Eve, which was statistically the least busy day for the registry. The charade could not be maintained for a large church wedding with press about. Apparently Molly’s face was extremely easy to read; she felt that the Holmes brothers were not the best judge of transparency but nonetheless, she was thankful for a simple ceremony rather than one where she would feel like a prize winning sheep at a fair.

Sherlock had smirked at her, mouthing things she couldn’t catch until she finally stared resolutely at Mr. Holmes’ third shirt button, just above his waistcoat. She would like to have seen him in tails and topcoat with grey gloves on his long sensitive fingers. As if on cue, he took her hands in his, wincing as they were clammy as a day old trout.

“I, Mycroft, take you, Margaret Elizabeth—,“ he said the familiar words, but he was using his professional voice and she began to shake with nerves, wondering if he would demand a wedding night after all. He had the power to keep her locked away in his flat forever. His fingers rubbed over hers, warming them.

She spoke her own vows to his shirt button, having to be prompted every third word like a dull child learning poetry. Her voice was wee and hoarse with a vibrato from her increasing tremors. He put the ring on her finger, and she saw it for the first time, the gold band lined with small yellow diamonds.

Anthea handed her his ring; she hadn’t known he was going to wear one since he already had a gold band on his right hand. Her chilled fingers dropped it, and it rolled to a stop at John’s feet. He stepped up and put it in her palm, wrapping her fingers around it and patting her elbow. Mr. Holmes’ band was slightly thicker and had a tiny yellow diamond in the center to match hers.

He took her hands again as the registrar said, “You may kiss the bride.”

“May I?” Mr. Holmes asked.

She nodded, licking lips dry as paper. Then his hand was under her chin, tilting her face up. She caught startling blue eyes and saw a tiny shaving cut on his chin which made her feel much better. Then his lips brushed hers in a kiss somewhere between social courtesy and elderly aunt.

“Good luck with all your endeavors,” John said, hugging her. She wished he was wearing his jumper so she could nuzzle it.

Mr. Holmes and Sherlock shook hands. “May you and your goldfish live happily ever after,” Sherlock said, laughing.

Molly assumed he was referring to the blank stare and open mouth she had exhibited for most of the day.

Anthea appeared to have come to the end of her present dosage and was looking worn. “You are supposed to move your engagement ring back to your left hand.”

“I’ll do that, Anthea. It’s my lookout as groom.”

Anthea rolled her eyes as Mr. Holmes took Molly’s hand and slid the ring into place. Just then the morning sun came out, flooding the room with light and causing the rings to burst into sunbeams. Molly smiled up at her new husband.

“Nearly there. A few photos and we can go home to a nice breakfast and a lie down.”

Molly felt like a duck in a roomful of giraffes. Fortunately there were few pictures left to be taken. She hadn’t even noticed the flash during the ceremony since the air had been dancing with gray spots. Her favorite photo was where they put their hands on the marriage license. Her least favorite was the one where she stood alone and the photographer kept trying to solicit a better smile.

Sherlock, impatient as ever, strode to the spot just behind the camera. “Molly, he has a cat, a ginger tabby.”

“Are you a tabby man? Oh, I have a Toby called tabby. I mean a tabby called Toby.” She laughed at her blooper, and this was the snap they chose for the papers with her looking like a super villain, laughing the victorious laugh of the criminally insane.

There was one last on the steps with everyone looking solemn as the wind eddied through their clothes and up their bums. Molly snuggled into her ivory wool coat designed to be worn this once as part of her wedding ensemble and longed for her parka.

For once, Anthea did not tagalong and Molly almost missed her animosity. Sitting alone in the backseat of a car beside her husband, she realized that she had never planned on being alone with him. They were going to live together even if she had her own room. She had really not thought this through at all. The romance might be make believe, but the sperm was anything but theoretical. It was going to take more than the scent of windmill biscuits for her to survive this sojourn.


	11. Second Hand Rose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Molly's first attempt at home insemination

_Molly took another sip of wine, hoping it would relax her for the task ahead. The baster was going to hurt. She leaned back against Mr. Holmes’ knees and stared into the fire._

_He sat in her favorite chair to keep her company, and she had ended up on the rug to be nearer the fire. She was cold clear through from nerves and not completely present._

_“Perhaps a back rub would loosen your muscles?”_

_“I’d like that.”_

_His fingers were firm as he kneaded her shoulders, and she sagged closer to the rug, letting her head hang down. One hand caressed the leather of his wingtips._

_“This would be more effective without your blouse in the way. Massages work better on bare skin.”_

_Her blush was not caused by wine or fire and spread from the top of her head down to her toes. She slowly unbuttoned her tatty shirt, but he pushed it down her shoulders along with her bra straps. Her arms were pinned at her sides as he rubbed out the stress of the day but created a new sort of tension within her.  
“I’ve read that fondling the breasts and nipples can trigger ovulation.”_

_The hooks of her bra gave way, his long cool fingers eased down her chest and--_

A small furry head bumped under her hand, sending sperm out of the test tube. “Oh my god, Toby! What have you done?”

For an average sized sperm sample, it had gone everywhere. Fortunately, she had put towels down on the bed. Unfortunately, she didn’t think scraping it off the towels was an option mainly because the viability was compromised and to a lesser degree, a risk of infection.

He would be waiting in his room, thinking conception had occurred, when actually Molly had bungled it. If she humiliated herself by asking, would he be able to produce another sample. How long was the refractory period for a fortysomething man? What if she did nothing? He would never know one way or the other. They had a few more tries with this cycle.

She leaned back against the pillows, body sagging in relief. Her heart rate slowed. Toby, now that the shouting was over, jumped back on the bed and sniffed cautiously at the sample. His wee pink tongue darted out to taste it. “Don’t, Toby. Be a good boy, please.”

She nudged him away then thought better of it. If he was used to the sight and smell of it, he would no longer be curious. He sniffed deeply then backed away sideways with his back arched and his tail bristling like a pine tree, three times its normal size. A few minutes later, he eased back towards the spill and pawed at the towel until the congealing puddle was covered. 

She didn’t feel like reading or watching telly or anything beyond staring at the room where she lay. The past few months had been a whirlwind of terrifying or awkward encounters over which she had no control, and now it had all focused on the pinpoint of a tiny egg that might or might not be ready yet. She was exhausted in all ways, pressured beyond all limits and frightened of the pain of the baster—a test run of the vagina-rending explosion of birth. Toby had given her a reprieve and she took it. 

Her arms and legs were weak from stress, and her breasts tender from too much self fondling. She pulled the duvet up over her and reveled in the shelter of the puffy cloud. If she could only sleep the night through and leave the stress behind for eight hours, then she could make a fresh start the next day. Molly drifted, enjoying freedom from worry. 

“Meow, meow!” Toby announced. 

He was on top of the armoire. Mycroft had installed small folding steps on the side away from the door. Molly kept them extended and Toby was able to climb up and survey the world from his perch. “Meow, meow,” he insisted. 

“Did you say ‘mama’? Are you flirting with mummy?”

He rolled on his back and waved his paws in the air, dusting the top of the furniture. Why did he had to be so adorable after being naughty? Sherlock was the same. 

“I’m still cross with you. You need to apologize.”

He bounded down the steps and launched himself onto the duvet, eventually settling himself on Molly’s chest where he nuzzled her neck and purred. 

“You’re happier here, aren’t you, love?”

The purring got louder. He pawed at her pony tail, and she took down her hair so he could bury his face in it. She ran her hand along his lithe body. The higher quality good had brought him to an appropriate weight, and his coat was softer and smoother.

He had canned food every day—all sorts of delicacies which he lapped up from a ceramic bowl with his name on it. He had his own bed and a basket full of toys. The balcony had wire mesh so that he could sun himself and taunt pigeons or carve his initials on the scratching post crafted to look like a small tree. There were all sorts of nooks in the cupboards for hiding, and his personal assistant came in twice daily to clean his box since Mycroft didn’t want Molly at risk for toxoplasmosis.

He had been quite kind throughout the week from the very beginning when she had a panic attack on their first homecoming as man and wife. In all the frantic preparations, she had been spared time to think, but when he had taken her coat and then carried a protesting Toby upstairs in his carrier basket, she had finally processed the reality of her situation. 

As she shook and hyperventilated, he got her to a chair, lit the fire, and made tea. Once she regained her sanity, he had shown her features of her room, and if she hadn’t known what a powerful man he was, she would have thought him shy and worried about her approval. “I was trying for seaside farm cottage with an underlying theme of nesting.”

She loved the bright, cheerful room with easy care, shabby chic furniture. He had used her colors of brown and yellow along with cream and robin’s egg blue. The tone on tone striped cream walls were topped with a border of yellow roses and brown nests, holding speckled blue eggs. 

A set of china sat in the hutch, and when she finished her tea, she found a wee nest painted in the bottom of the cup. She was not as fond of the pitcher which was shaped like a mother bird that regurgitated tea from her beak. 

Outside her private rooms, there was a well stocked library with a full size viewing screen that slipped down from the ceiling at the touch of a button. The walls were soundproofed and she was welcome to watch any movie from his massive collection or play the music of her choice on the surround sound. All was built in so it still looked Victorian. A large table by the window invited study although she had her own roll top desk in her rooms and her own laptop. The leather couch cradled her. Toby had the run of the house which she hadn’t allowed yet. 

She had napped after breakfast, but in the long afternoon of that first day, he had put on _Nottinghill_ for her and she had brought her knitting in. He had looked less formidable in jeans and a cardigan with his reading glasses perched on his nose and his hand spanning a large, dry looking book.

She sighed and rolled over, then gingerly removed the towel from beneath her. Toby took a running leap at it from bed to floor, sliding on the reclaimed hardwood, and promptly put his mouse under it. He liked to stage hunting scenarios so she watched as he trotted out of the room for a drink. When he returned, he sidled up to the rug, pounced on it, then stood up in a grizzly bear pose, arms out, paws spread wide. 

She sighed and reached up to stroke the green patina of her tall brass bed with a little stool quilt folded at the foot. She checked the candles lit throughout the room. Whenever she burned one, it was replaced. She burned them for the sheer joy of abundance and not to cover the odor of the litter box or to warm her hands over in a frigid apartment. The room smelled of plums and vanilla, and their golden glow made her feel pretty. 

She went to the loo, cleaning herself where she had been wet to the knees from her wank session. The towels were fluffy and big as blankets, brown so she didn’t have to worry about stains. The wash cloths were rough the way that she liked them. She glowed after a good scrubbing. The bath was full of pampering products which were also magically restocked. There was a plum scented body wash she wanted to drink as a smoothie and something called a body soufflé that she swore was chocolate mousse. 

She wandered into the sitting room and made cocoa with whole milk and lit the fire. A stack of best sellers sat on the occasional table by her chair. Her knitting had its own new basket and she could afford to buy the yarn to finish her project. A custom built yellow lap top sat at her desk. She had been doing her fertility charting on it as well as reading a great deal of porn-without-plot mpreg fan fiction.

Toby jumped on her lap. “I have to make every day count, love. He’s been very good to us, you see.”

She sighed and pulled her dressing gown tight around her. She put on the fuzzy slippers that he had brought her that first day when her feet were frozen and aching from wearing high heels in the cold. They were toasty cable knit on top like jumpers for her feet. 

It was a long way to his room, and she felt she was reporting to the headmaster’s office because she hadn’t completed her lessons. Her feeble knock was answered immediately. He was wearing his glasses and had a sheaf of papers in his hand.

“I’ve made a terrible mistake.”

He blanched as the papers drifted to the floor. 

“No, not that terrible. Damn it.” She knelt to pick up the papers. 

“I’m sorry, dear, but you don’t have the security clearance to touch those.”

She crouched in the doorway and covered her eyes.

He chuckled. “No need to go that far.”

But she stayed there. Hiding her eyes also hid her blushes for the still fresh fantasy, the damp in the knickers she had pulled on, and the glimpse of his inner sanctum as well as the rolled up sleeves that revealed a furry forearm dotted with peach freckles.

His hands cupped her elbows, helping her up. “You can look now, Molly. All state secrets tucked away.”

She was enveloped in that scent of windmill biscuits, and he eyes caught sight of a tuft of ginger chest hair peeking out from the unbuttoned top button. If there was that much hair at his throat, then there would be loads of it everywhere. It begged to be petted for her to know if it was soft or wiry. Bloody hell, she was ovulating. She’d be humping his leg next and bless him, the way he had decorated her rooms he was likely gay as a maypole. She imagined him wiping her secretions off his trousers with a handkerchief, nostrils flaring at the musk. 

“You were saying that there had been a mistake?”

“I spilled the s-s-sample.” He mustn’t know Toby had done it, or he’d be out on his ear. “I was nervous and my had slipped.”

“I see.”

There was nowhere for her to look without death by mortification. She watched a flush spread up his throat, catching his bitable Adam’s apple. “I didn’t know how long your refractory period was, if a second sample might be possible.”

“I can try. Will it be viable though?”

She cocked her head and squinted. “Viable?” 

“Perhaps the first was my best effort for today?”

He was wondering if there would be enough motile sperm. A fair question and scientific minded, but somehow hilarious under the strain. “It won’t be first blush.”

“Not the pick of the litter.”

“Not first harvest.”

“Not a bumper crop.” He understood dark humour! It was a lovely surprise. “A baby conceived with second batch sperm is still a baby.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

She felt like a builder as if she needed to spit in her hand and shake his. Standing in the doorway, she was overcome with shyness and a growing warmth. They would both be wanking tonight which made it less lonely. 

“I’ll need a minute.” He actually winked at her. “A bit more than a minute, I fear.”

“Of course, Carry on.” She backed slowly into the hall. “Best of luck.”

Back in her room, she sipped at her cocoa and stared into flames the changing colors of his glorious chest hair.


	12. Bird in a Gilded Cage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The stillness of the waiting time after inseminating herself causes Molly to have some disturbing flashbacks. 
> 
> Trigger warning for molestation and female incest.

“God help me, God help me, God help me, bloody fucking hell.” It hurt. The baster fucking hurt like a log jammed into a key hole. Tears of pain and shock ran down her face. The pain was sharp and hot, taking her breath, leaving her shaken and nauseated. Her muscles spasmed around the thick plastic. Even though she had filled herself full of lube until it ran down her legs and in spite of having warmed the baster as much as she dared without killing the sperm, she still had to grit her teeth and shove it in, muffling her whimpers into a pillow. The sperm might not even be able to get through all the lube, like swimming through jelly. Four pillows were jammed under her bum to give the little fellows every chance, swimming downhill. Her legs hung down from the stack of pillows; her left leg convulsed in a charley horse.

If she could hang on, she had made her last attempt for the month. Five efforts, two on either side of what might be ovulation day; each try more painful than the last. She was stuck flat on her back unable to watch tell or knit; her mobile lay out of reach because she had been stressed from dreading the pain. Toby had come and marched on her hair for awhile but even he had grown bored and gone into the other room for pigeon patrol. Without distraction, the familiar pain took her back.

_Grandma Mae gripped Molly’s arm with her clawed hand. “Daddy has to work late and Mummy has one of her headaches. This will be a good time for me to check if you’re being a good girl.”_

_“I have been, Grandma, I promise,” Molly lied._

_She dragged her feet as she was led into her grandmother’s bedroom. It smelled of liniment and dust, and she would smell like that afterwards no matter how many times she washed. But Molly was small for her age and no match for her grandmother who tottered along in public as if fragile, but was sturdy and strong as an ox at home. She stood in the doorway, shivering even though nothing had happened yet. Maybe today would be different; maybe she had learned how to tell better lies._

_Grandma put on the glasses that made her eyes look really big like monsters and turned the bright lamp toward the bed. “Off with your knickers and quick about it.”_

_“No,” Molly said, meaning to shout, but Mummy’s head hurt and she would get a spanking if she woke her. “No,” she said again, but her voice was shaking._

_“Little girls don’t tell their grandmas ‘no’ or they get a spanking. After we check you, your bottom will already be bare and ready for a good thrashing.”_

_Molly shook her head and backed toward the door. She could run away, hide somewhere, but it was getting dark and Daddy wouldn’t be home for hours. Grandma’s arm shot out, and Molly was jerked toward the bed, her uniform skirt and knickers jerked down as she was shoved face down into the smelly, sticky bedspread._

_“I’ll do the spanking first so you pay attention for the rest. This is for your good, Mousie. It gives me no pleasure to examine you, but naughty girls must be controlled, and you are the naughtiest little girl in the world.”_

_The open handed smacks didn’t hurt nearly as much as what came next. The worst of the spankings was trying to breathe while not getting more of the smell in her nose. She thought about the story she was writing about a family of kittens that lived in Big Ben. One would be a tabby, her favorite kind because they looked like wee tigers. She had seen one in the alley by their building and pretended that she kept it in her room as a secret friend, but she was old enough to know that she didn’t have money to feed it and that its poo would stink and give her away eventually._

_The spanking had stopped and now Grandma was putting on the gloves like Mummy wore for the washing up. They were yellow and smelled of rubber. Her cheeks were pulled apart. “Are you wiping yourself properly?”_

_“Yes, Grandma.”_

_Molly couldn’t ignore the glove feeling around on her bottom. It felt rather good if she hadn’t been so afraid. Sometimes in bed at night, she tried to do it to herself to see what Grandma felt when she was back there, but her arms were too short to reach._

_Grandma put something from a tube on the glove and pushed her finger inside Molly. This wasn’t the part that hurt because Grandma’s finger was smaller than Molly’s poo, but she didn’t want it to be Grandma. She thought she wouldn’t mind if Dr. Carson or the nice nurse at school did it. She wondered how other little girls felt about such things, but she didn’t have any school chums to ask._

_Grandma pulled her finger out and Molly was afraid she would go. She thought if she was really so very naughty, she would do a shit on Grandma’s bed. The bad word helped her be braver. Naughty girls said bad words._

_“Roll over and we’ll check your bump. Have you been touching it?”_

_“No, Grandma,” Molly lied again. She was going to hell for all sorts of reasons, more lies would not make the flames any cooler._

_Grandma jerked off her shoes, hurting Molly’s ankle. Her socks stuck to the bedspread when Grandma spread her legs apart. The bedspread was scratchy on her arse, another bad word to get her through._

_Grandma didn’t use gloves for this part. “Are you touching your bump? It’s cancer, a tumor, but it won’t grow if you leave it alone.”_

_Molly wondered why Grandma was touching it then, but she gritted her teeth and kept her opinions to herself. Molly touched herself every night, and she had used a mirror to see her bump which looked red and angry with a little white stuff around it. Mummy had told her that her knickers stunk so she had stopped wearing them at night for the touching. She pretended she was in hospital and a kind doctor was examining her before he operated. It was a good touch if a doctor did it._

_Her nipples got hard when Grandma touched her there; that’s how she knew she was a dirty girl. Grandma told her all the time that she was. She didn’t have to believe the words, but she couldn’t ignore her body._

_“Dirty little mouse, I think it’s getting bigger. Soon it will hang down between your legs like a dirty little cock. What man would want a dirty girl with a cock? He doesn’t want a cock; he wants a hole to put his cock in.”_

_Molly knew what was coming and braced herself, clutching handfuls of the rough, sticky fabric. She tried to close her legs but Grandma was strong. A finger went in her down there, hard and rough, the nail scratching her inside. It was too big for that hole, Molly couldn’t even get her own little finger in there, but Grandma pushed with a grunt. “I’ve got to make sure no man’s been in there. Men can tell if you touch yourself, Molly. They can smell it, and they’ll come for you on the street, lift your skirt and do their business. They can’t help themselves. It’s up to you to keep your legs together and keep your hole closed up tight.”_

_The pain took away all of the brave feelings Molly had. She always thought Grandma’s fingernail had cut her open. The pain was sharp and hot and it went all the way through until Molly couldn’t breathe or move or remember anything before this time. The tears would run and she would get in trouble for that too._

_“Don’t cry, little mousie. You’ll worry Mummy, and Mummy is so sick.”_

_Molly sucked her tears in while she pulled her clothes back on. Finally safe in her own room, she did her lessons and then read her book. She was several levels ahead of the other children. The librarian picked out special books just for her from the young adult section. Her teacher liked her and let her stay in some times during games to help organize the classroom. When she got one of her headaches, the school nurse was kind. They didn’t know how naughty she was._

_Daddy came home to make her tea. He was so very tired as he made baked beans on toast again. Molly ate it without a word as if she could get a word in with Grandma chattering away, telling tales on all the neighbors. Daddy had too many worries. He must never know that Molly was bad._

Molly came back to herself. Her legs had fallen asleep and her eyes burned with unshed tears. It was rare for her to go back to that time any more, yet any touches below the waist triggered her. How Jim had laughed at her flat chest and her impenetrable hole surrounded by a thick bush. “Oh honey, virginity is so over.”

But he was exposed before they had done anything beyond heavy petting, and in the end, she was very lucky that things hadn't gone so far. She shivered and pulled her dressing gown tighter around her. 

When Molly was nine, all the girls had the class that taught them about menstruation. Molly remembered how powerful she had felt to learn that her clitoris was a normal part of every woman’s body. She was not going to die of cancer. The diagrams helped her understand what her grandmother had been doing; the lecture on protecting and caring for your own body helped her realize that other girls weren’t getting the treatment that she was in their homes. 

She would always be thankful that the class had come before she started her monthly cycle. She couldn’t imagine the terror of the molestation coupled with bleeding. Her mother’s headaches had lessened with a new medication. 

_One night when Daddy had taken Mummy out to dinner to celebrate her feeling better, Mae had approached Molly again. Molly remembered the words in her pamphlet. Mummy was not asleep in the next room with a headache; she could be as loud as she liked. “Do not touch me!” Molly said very loud. “I will tell. You are the bad one. Only evil people touch little girls.”_

_“You won’t tell. It would hurt your Daddy too much.”_

_“He would want me to be safe. He would help me.”_

_“No one would believe you. I’m just a lonely old woman.” Mae made her body look frail the way she did in public to get people to do things for her._

_“I will tell until somebody believes me and you will go to jail. Bad things happen to child molesters in jail.”_

Mae didn’t touch her again, but she did keep up a steady stream of poison whenever they were alone. Men were evil, lustful beasts. Girls who enjoyed sex were going to hell. No man would want her with her great big bump between her legs. And the questions about her wanking were constant. Mae said that she could smell her.

Molly’s mum died when she was fifteen. It was a relief really since she had been ill for so long. Molly’s marks at school indicated that she was going to be able to break free of her upbringing through education. There was hope and a way out. 

Molly lived in the library as much as possible, trying for perfect marks in all subjects. She was good at maths and science but at creative writing too. All of her villains were based on Mae. There were still times when she was stuck in the flat with Mae while her dad worked. One evening when the toxic social commentary had gone on for over an hour, something snapped in Molly. “Shut your pie hole, you twisted old bitch. It is not too late for me to expose your sick habits. Shall I tell Dad and have you evicted? No reason to keep you around now that your daughter’s dead.”

Molly danced on the line of becoming a perpetrator of elder abuse until she went to uni. Mae learned to keep her mouth shut until a stroke shut it for her. Her death meant one less person to mock Molly or bring her down.

Mae’s death came too late to undo the damage to her psyche. Therapists had tried to help her all through university, but whenever anyone other than herself came near her genitals, the gate slammed shut. Most men never phoned after the first date so it was seldom a pressing issue. Sherlock was gay, Jim was a criminal. Busy with school and work, she had been content with clitoral stimulation when not exhausted. Now she needed her vagina to join the party, and it was too late for intensive therapy. She would have to force the muscles and hope for the best. 

Birth was painful. Surely pain at conception wouldn’t hurt the baby. This baby was wanted desperately and completely unlike her unsolicited arrival; it would have to feel the love that Mycroft had. She lifted her numb legs off the pillows with her hands and curled into the fetal position with one hand on her stomach. “Hello, little one. Welcome. You are wanted here. We planned for you.”

The pillows were soft. She was warm for the first winter since she could remember. Toby was safe and well fed. But the beautiful surroundings didn’t fill up her heart; she was still starved for intimacy with no clue how to get it. There were no instruction manuals on how to make friends once you became an adult. A stranger lived down the hall. She held one of the pillows to her, pretending it was a person she could hug, pretending that there was a baby started and she was no longer alone. Cramps kept her awake most of the night.


	13. Start Me Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mycroft asks to be present at conception.

“I’d like to be present. For the conception,” Mycroft said at dinner.

Molly choked on her cake and spewed chocolate crumbs all over the snowy tablecloth. 

Mycroft blushed like a mortal man. “Not the procedure, dear. Afterwards, when things are tidy, at your convenience, perhaps we could spend some time together.”

She couldn’t refuse him when his eyes had been so sad about their first failure. “I’m so very sorry,” Molly had said to him, not for failing, but for the fact that he had no one either and had been forced to make a child in such a humiliating way.

Oh, he had been supportive and understanding. “It’s early days yet. All the time in the world.”

She was relieved when he asked her to dinner. Their partnership might seem less like two patrons of an exclusive hotel. But it wasn’t about two lonely people having dinner but about one employer wanting to monitor the process.

“There’s not much to see, M-myc-uh-croft. I try to stand on my head for as long as I can. It’s rather dull.”

“I’m in Parliament. Dull is not a new concept.”

“I suppose you know by now that I’m not a sparkling conversationalist.”

“No, but a rather entertaining one.” He winked at her and it was her turn to blush. 

The time passed quickly from her period until next ovulation. Molly worked as much as possible, addicted to the shrinking of her debt. She had more energy with good nutrition and adequate sleep in a safe environment. Her laundry and cleaning were done for her which left her limited leisure time for movies or long baths.

She even had a driver. Mycroft did not want his potential child exposed to danger on the tube, her status as an MP’s wife notwithstanding. Her driver was a kind, older man called David. She worried about him, being out so late, but he said the job was a godsend, easy work that he could manage and still be home with his wife who was ill. He was friendly but preoccupied with worry so she didn’t have to make small talk after a difficult shift.

She had the commute for decompressing from her work stress. Sometimes David gave her little treats like a tiny box of sweets or a perfect yellow rose. “From the mister,” David would say, “for his lady.”

David didn’t know the marriage was imaginary. He saw what he wanted to see. Marjorie the housekeeper was more savvy but was too attached to her job to acknowledge the truth outright. “Your mess is my bread and butter, Mrs. Molly; don’t you give it another thought.”

She had twice the energy that Molly had at twice Molly’s age, and her angular frame and bristling bob of gray hair were always popping up, dusting or hovering as Molly roamed freely about the house during the day when Mr. Holmes was gone. Marjorie didn’t need small talk either. She would peer over her small round glasses. “Did you eat in the past four hours?”

Molly was never sure if she had. Marjorie would bring her something healthy but delicious—vegetables cut into shapes with little china dishes of hummus, green salads with fruit and cheese on them, oatmeal laced with walnuts and cranberries. Then she would tidy the room until Molly had eaten her snack. Marjorie walked six miles per day, rain or shine, and Molly was now doing yoga with her three times a week. “We need to make you flexible for the birthing process.”

Molly pictured Marjorie kneeling between the stirrups with hands cupped, ready to catch the baby, but that would be Mr. Holmes’ job. Here was another part of the commitment that she had not considered. He would see all of her naughty bits in the birthing room.

If he came to her room after she had inseminated herself and if he viewed her pajama clad bottom while her knees were around her ears, what was that compared to shitting herself while a long awaited alien came out of her twat?

Mycroft folded his napkin and edged away from the table. “If it would be too awkward, I’ll understand. Wouldn’t want to disturb. It’s not required.”

“No, come ahead. The more the merrier.”

Molly regretted her hardy and cavalier invitation when ovulation time came. Five sessions, two days each side of her target day. One stranger in her private rooms, minutes after she wanked and then tore open her insides with searing pain which triggered flashbacks. There were too many levels of social awkwardness to count. Before she could whip herself into a frenzy, she texted. _Ready. Come on through._

She left the outer door and the one to her bedroom ajar and hoisted her legs onto the tower of pillows. “I’m in here,” she called to him when she heard his footsteps in the outer hall. Toby ran under the bed.

Mycroft came to the door but hesitated. “That looks uncomfortable. Is it really necessary? I don’t recall that being part of the process with the traditional method.”

“I want to give them every chance.”

“My old swimmers.”

“No, it’s more about getting my body in the proper spirit. I feel better doing something that I can actually see.”

“May I offer improvements on your design?”

“Please do.” She imagined him cupping her bottom and moving her legs around. Horny warred with the seething cramps of her beleaguered interal muscles, but he had gone into the other room. There were sounds of furniture being moved about. Toby had probably burrowed into the center of the mattress by now.

“Come see if this works any better.”

He had tipped one of the wing chairs onto its back and used the seat cushion and the needlepoint pillows to form a more graduated ramp. He rolled a towel to put under her neck. “I think your back and legs will have more support this way.”

“It is a clever design.” She got down on the floor, clumsily maneuvering herself onto it, but once her legs were up, she felt much better. They might not go to sleep since they could rest on the legs of the chair. The seat cushion was firmer and her neck was supported too. “Well done.”

After covering her with her favorite throw, he surprised her by sitting on the floor with his back against the other chair. He was in her sight line. “What have you been doing while you wait?”

“Nothing really. I read for a little while but my arms get tired of holding the book up. I can’t see telly. Sometimes if I remember, I listen to music.”

There was another strained pause in which Mr. Holmes stared at her. He seemed to be trying to will the sperm into her spout via hypnosis. “Shall I read to you?”

“I’d like that.”

A few minutes passed as he perused her shelves. She had thought he would go get a book of his choosing. His options in her collection would be steamy bodice rippers (her wank collection), medical textbooks, or girlhood favorites. “This one seems to be most loved. I’ll start here.”

He held up _Little Women_ ; his hands made it look small.

“It’s very girly.”

“We might have a little girl, and I should like to be prepared.”

“Have you read it or seen the movie?”

“Haven’t a clue. Outside of my wheelhouse. Is it a classic?”

“Very much so.”

“Then I shall enjoy the discovery.”

He pulled reading glasses from the pocket of his cardigan and read the familiar words,

_“Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents,” grumbled Jo, lying on the rug._

As he read the opening scene that introduced her old friends whom he met for the first time, Molly could look at him without embarrassment since his focus was on the text. She liked the way his big hands cradled the book and dwarfed it, recalling how large the book had seemed in her arms the first time that she read it. She liked the way he turned a page and smoothed it as if it were precious. He seemed to do everything with earnest care where she was concerned.

His reading voice was excellent, and it changed for each character. It might have been silly for a grown man to portray a thirteen year old girl but managed without being self conscious. The story didn’t matter anyway so much as his gentle tone. Her body unclenched as he turned each page, moving deeper into the story, pausing once to adjust his glasses.

He seemed younger in casual clothes although still posh. Only the top button of his tan shirt was unbuttoned but his brown cable knit cardigan looked soft and touchable. The sleeves were pushed up so that his brown leather watch strap showed dark against the pale underside of his arm. The freckles weren’t everywhere then.

His Adam’s apple bobbed in the pale column of his throat as he swallowed. His wedding band glistened in the firelight. She moved her hand slightly so the light caught on her rings. As she told herself many times a day, she was married, sham or not.

She wished she could reach out and touch his wingtips or snuggle her cheek against his sweater. The attraction was all hormonal, of course. It was her body and primal brain trying to assure itself that if she were fertilized, her offspring would be protected. She thought that he would defend her for the baby’s sake.

If she had known how attractive and approachable he would be without his suit, she might have given the agreement more thought. She would have to guard her own heart and thoughts more closely. One gay man was enough to fall in love with in her life time. Still, it didn’t hurt to look at him. His autumn colors fit well into the muted browns and yellows of her cottage rooms. He had make a potentially embarrassing situation comfortable. There was no harm in being safe and warm.

“There’s the end of the chapter, a good stopping point. I shall make tea and by the time it’s steeped, we can get you out of your torture device.”

He levered himself up from the floor with ease. She imagined him doing so after playing peekaboo with a baby or building blocks with a toddler. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a scrap of paper to use as a bookmark. She couldn’t wait to see what it was. Then he reached down to pat the arm of the chair as he walked past. She would have given anything for a pat on the knee even through the thick blanket. In spite of knowing how badly it would all end with her still alone and starved for affection, she would have followed him anywhere.


End file.
